'The Genetic Choir is an extraordinary laboratory to test numerous relevant questions in the field of music evolution, psychology and computer music, such as simulating musical intuition in a computer system.'

Marcelo Gimenes, Computer Music Researcher, University of Plymouth

the genetic choir: vocal instant composing

The Genetic Choir is a utopian singing ensemble.

Believing in the possibility that we can be both self-decided as individuals and work together as a group, the Genetic Choir sings instant composition concerts with all music created on the spot.

Anything – from the characteristic silence of a building to a pattern on the floor or a conversation between audience members – can form the basic ingredient for our music.

Our music is related to chaos theory, complexity principles and the self-organising patterns of interrelated nodes in a living network. Genetic Choir compositions create meaning and beauty from seeming randomness, not unlike genes that multiply and mutate or oscillators that sync with each other after a certain tipping point.

As we are singers of flesh and blood, the human component plays a role as well: Intention, timing, taste – 'free will' against group tendency and the imposing logic of the music itself. In this way, the Genetic Choir explores also the contemporary human condition: We are both active and reactive in creating our reality, and we can never oversee the whole. How can we, then, best act in the complex, networked society of today?

We create music that is heartfelt and unpredictable. We elevate an approach that operates through pattern-orientation and feedback cycles to a festival of sounds and musicality.